EIGHT STROKES OF THE CLOCK

Arsène Lupin used to tell me these events, as though they had happened

In my opinion, given the manner in which they were conducted, the acts, the behaviour, and the hero's very character, it is difficult for me not to see the two pals as one and the same person.

 Arsène Lupin is gifted with a powerful imagination and is quite capable of attributing to himself adventures which are not his at all and of disowning those which are really his. The reader will judge for himself.

Maurice Marie Émile Leblanc (November 11, 1864 – November 6, 1941) was a French author and short storey writer best remembered for creating Arsène Lupin, the mythical gentleman thief and detective.

In 1905, French novelist Maurice Leblanc developed Arsène Lupin, a fictitious gentleman thief and master of disguise. Until a local politician with the same name objected, he was known as Arsène Lopin. In a series of short stories serialised in the journal Je sais tout, the character was initially introduced.